Investigation of code switching among Persian speaking Iranian students in Turkey using matrix language frame model

One of the interesting issues in bilingualism is the dynamic use of code switching in interpersonal interactions among bilinguals. The present study was conducted among to investigate the principles of Matrix Language Framework model as one of the well-known models in bilingualism studies using data from Persian- Turkish language pairs. This model was proposed by Myers Scotton and has been used in many works on code switching. It was attempted to investigate whether the principles of this model apply to the Persian-Turkish language pairs. In addition, in the current study, the reasons for the use of code switching were examined. For this purpose, two research tools were used. First, the code switching data was collected and extracted from the voice messages from WhatsApp application shared between the author and the participants. Moreover, the research participants were interviewed in order to discover the reasons for the use of code switching in their speech. The research findings indicated that code switching is quite common and normal among participants, especially in informal settings where bilingual individuals can freely switch between their languages. Furthermore, the results showed that the participants used the code switching from Persian to Turkish mostly at lexical levels. Therefore, intra-sentence code switching type was more frequent than inter-sentence code switching type. Overall, the research findings supported the principles of the Matrix Language Framework model for Persian – Turkish language pair